BIG NEWS : The InsectNet Marketplace

[wollastoni]

Today is a big day for InsectNet, we launch The InsectNet Marketplace !
It is a modern marketplace to buy and sell your insects.

For sellers, it is very interesting as the fees are very low versus eBay and InsectNet has 30.000 yearly visitors.
There is 0 listing fee, 0 store fee and only 5% final value fee (versus 12% on eBay).

For buyers, it is a way to find a lot of specimens, to shop among verified sellers and to finance InsectNet forum.

Several sellers have asked me to work on this because eBay has many issues :
- very high fees that are increasing year after year,
- fakes and illegal specimens
- listing limitation
Having a marketplace on InsectNet, we can better control the market.

In the seashell market, eBay is much smaller than shellauction. The idea is to do the same with the insect market.

To be frank, it has been a very strong financial investment and I hope it will work.
So I count on you all to help us. If you have some specimens for sale, please list them on the InsectNet Marketplace. If you want to purchase specimens, please have a look to the InsectNet Marketplace.

As I told you, many sellers are very interested in this project. And in this first day of the marketplace, there are already 750 insects for sale !
You can find some world rarity Papilionidae and Delias. Some South American Sphingidae at low price. Some huge Cetoniidae. Some rare Lucanidae and many others... so already a LOT of insects and we are only day 1.

Here is the marketplace link : marketplace.insectnet.com/
You can already register, buy and sell insects.

If you have some questions, please read our FAQ page : marketplace.insectnet.com/content/faq-help.html
And you can also contact us : [e-mail]

[mothman27]

It this any different than Insect-deal ? 

[exoticimports]

I think this is great! I dislike Eghay.

Question: you've posted a number of set specimens (which is what I need to do). How do you ship them? Set like that, in Riker mounts, relaxed and dried?

[wollastoni]

Feb 1, 2019 9:24:23 GMT -8 exoticimports said:

I think this is great! I dislike Eghay.
Question: you've posted a number of set specimens (which is what I need to do). How do you ship them? Set like that, in Riker mounts, relaxed and dried?

Thanks a lot !
I send them set like that. I have been sending set specimens for 10 years now without any issue.
You just need to do a double packaging to protect your specimens.

[wollastoni]

Feb 1, 2019 7:45:20 GMT -8 mothman27 said:

It this any different than Insect-deal ? 

It is the new version of Insect-Deal (which is now redirected towards the InsectNet Marketplace.

The main advantage is to be present directly on InsectNet where there are already 30.000 visitors ! It was hard to drive visitors on Insect-Deal.
There are other advantages : sellers can automatically send invoice to combine shipping, and so on.
The marketplace will also help recruit new members to the forum.

[exoticimports]

At 5% cost, can we sell all the rest of our stuff here instead of eGhey? :-)

Chuck

[wollastoni]

Of course, it is open to all serious sellers .

eBay has increased too much their fees in these last years : 12% final value fees + listing fees + store fees + listing limitation.
They don't cherish their sellers anymore... I guess they are too big.

[bichos]

We've seen many such platforms come and go...

[wollastoni]

Feb 1, 2019 11:09:07 GMT -8 bichos said:

We've seen many such platforms come and go...

Thanks for your encouragements

[bichos]

Feb 1, 2019 11:45:43 GMT -8 wollastoni said:

Feb 1, 2019 11:09:07 GMT -8 bichos said:

We've seen many such platforms come and go...

Thanks for your encouragements

Am I wrong?

Hows ot better. So I click on it. Go to beetles cos that's all I care about and it takes me to hymenoptera. I'm unlikely to click on it again.
Top 100 on the other hand , I use it all the time. It does take me to evil but highly functional and reliable Ebay.

[wollastoni]

Time will tell, my friend.
I know only one failed attempt : the one of Clark 10 years ago. The idea was great but his software was very cheap.

Then why do I think it will work :
- being owner of Collector's Secret, InsectNet and Insecterra, we have an unprecedented strength to drive traffic on the marketplace. 7.000 registered members, 80.000 yearly visitors
- being admin of the main facebook entomo groups also helps. 10.000 members
- knowing personnally most of the insect dealers, it helps having a lot of material on it. Already 800 listed insects on day 1.
- in the recent years, ebay has pissed off many insect sellers who ask me to work on an alternative to protect their business.

So of course, it won't beat eBay in one year.
But let's talk again in 5 years and we will see.
When I created Collector's Secret and the Top 100, many people told me it was useless. Now it has more than 30.000 visitors per year and helped me quit my job and become my own boss.

PS : yes I have seen the issue on the home images. It works on mobile but not on desktop, don't know why. We are on it to solve it asap.
Here is the beetle category link : marketplace.insectnet.com/beetle-coleoptera/
420 beetles already listed.

[papilio28570]

Thank you, thank you, thank you. Good luck and you have my support as buyer and seller.

[drewalan2]

I don't know what the beetle problem can be. I accessed it once yesterday morning and another time just now and I went directly to beetles each time. Good luck with the site; I think it is great!

Drew

[wollastoni]

Thank you all.
And thank you to the 80 members who have registered in 3 days.
Already 1.200 USD of sales on the new platform, it is a good start.

There are few little informatic bugs that we will fix during the week. Except these, the marketplace work very well.
If you have any doubt, question, we are here to help : [e-mail]

[joachim]

the site is vey good and no so silly exceptions as on ebay.